ANALYSIS: The French company with a British heritage

Alstom is one of the world’s leading train manufacturers and power station builders — and it has been at the centre of several controversies in the UK.

Most recently it has been involved in rows over the import of cheap foreign workers into the British power industry. It is the contractor at the Staythorpe power station, where unions first made such allegations, and again more recently similar accusations were made at Pembroke, where Alstom is building a new gas-fired power station.

In Britain, Alstom has been best known for building and maintaining the Pendolino tilting trains capable of running at 140mph on Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Trains network out of London Euston to Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow.